Spurred on by a thread that was spurred on by a thread...How does your magic F/C match your setting?

[Nomadic]

For unconquered realm I am not yet certain what sort of magic I want. I haven't yet reached that point in its creation. All I know is that it is fantasy based but everything has a darker survivalist undertone. Perhaps I will have a system like vreegs forcing them to ration their spells, perhaps I will have something else. In time though I am going to have to see how best to shape it to the campaign. But then again, I always did enjoy doing that (after all I wouldn't be designing worlds if I didn't).

[SA]

I have read your Anima thread, but wasn't sure whether you were intending it for comments, or what sorts of feedback you were looking for. I love the ideas in that thread and in this one, though, and the combination of the two tidbits of information has fascinating implications.

Thanks.  I was actually inspired by your own circle magic.  Feel free to clutter up the thread, that's what it's there for.

[LordVreeg]

and as for out new members, I want answers here....

[Steerpike]

Though magic ("Witchcraft") is still pretty fuzzy on the Cadaverous Earth, I'm moving towards a kind of "semiotic" system based around signs/signifiers and symbols.  A symbol (a word, a gesture, or most commonly a scribed glyph) gets infused with mana/"numina" from a nebulously defined place I've just been calling the Aether (read: cop-out plane of arcane resonance) which is sort of the collective unconscious, in a quasi-Jungian sense of the word.  So you've got hexes - spells, basically - and then glyphs and wards and sigils, which are mostly used to create magic tattoos, protect a location, bind a demon, or reanimate something (like a fleshcrafted servitor).  There are branches of magic that all depend on a similar system: fleshcraft (Frankenstein stuff), shamanism (very tribal), diabolism (demon-summoning), and some other less well-defined forms.

How this is going to translate into crunchy goodness I don't know (and that kind of scares me).  I'm actually not as jaded with the Vancian spell system as some seem to be round here - Vance is after all a big influence on my settings - so a kind of tooled up version of that, or some kind of mana ("numina") pool system with a lot of glyphs and such might work well.

The whole thing gets complicated by nectar, an arcane drug that super-charges a caster (I'm thinking more slots/day, or more mana points, or something similar, like in dnd terms all spells are empowered or something).  Overdose however and you go mad.  I'm thinking of having some kind of sanity or taint system in the Cadaverous Earth so that players exposed to too much of its Horror go slowly crazy or can snap altogether.  On of those Lovecraft systems or even the madness system from the old Wheel of Time d20 RPG might be worth stealing or adapting...

In the Tangle I was thinking of a radically more simple, ritual-based magic system, except for the faerie.  Humans can cast a "spell" just by saying the magic words or combining the dove's blood with garlic or whatever crazy thing the spellbook tells them to do.  There's no limit to spells per day, but casting takes a lot of time, and knowledge of magic and ritual is quite uncommon.  The faerie can cut out all the ritual and stuff and channel pure "glamer" instinctively, which I think would work mostly through a set of well-defined special abilities or spell-like abilities rather than through a typical casting system.

[Llum]

I don't really play, but I could see myself designing a new system to handle how we wanted magic to work, I know for a fact me and my friend have done that a few times for a game hes programming.

The latest incarnation is that every char has three "slots". Each slot can have a single bar (you'll understand in a second). Their are 9 different types of bars, Magic-based Battle, Support and Control, Melee-based Battle, Support and Control trees, and ?-based (we haven't decided if its going to be psychic/science/technology or what have you) Battle Support and Control trees, 9 total.

The way each bar works is that you start at a 0 value, and the bar goes from 100 to -100. In the Warmth bar (Magic-based Battle) their are two kinds of spells, fire and ice. Ice spells cost heat, so they have a negative cost (-20 as an example) and fire spells have a positive cost (+20 as an example). So you start at 0, then cast spells as you do, but lets say your at -95, and Icebolt costs -10, you couldn't cast it as that would bring you over (under) the -100 limit, so you would have to cast a spell to raise your warmth first.

Warmth (Ice---Fire) is the Magic-based Battle, Nature (Air---Earth) is the Magic-based support, Spirit (Dark---Light) is the Magic-based Control bars.
Speed (Fast---Slow), Style (Dirty---Honorable) are two Melee-based bars.

[Acrimone]

My solution to this was essentially in four steps.

First, I had a fairly clear notion of how I wanted the world to be on a macro level, and I picked the Rolemaster system to accomodate that vision.

Then I started shaping some of the details of the world in accordance with the Rolemaster mechanics.  For instance, I knew that I wanted schools of magic, so what I did was I adopted the Rolemaster Professions (some of them, anyway) as my "schools" and set the Wizard's College up based on how the Rolemaster Magic system worked.

Then, as I started working out even more detail in my world, I started f***ing with the Rolemaster magic system on a fundamental level, to more closely match the vision that I had.  I have completely gutted the notion of "open" and "closed" lists, made a mockery of the notion that different types of magic have to be "balanced" against each other, and redone the power point system so that it's completely unrecognizable as having come from Rolemaster.  I wanted magic users to be able to do MORE magic, so I gave them the ability to "store" up to seven day's worth of power points.  But I also wanted powerful magic to be exhausting, so I created a system that increases (almost exponentially but not quite) the cost of high level spells.

Finally,  I started reworking some of my magic theory fluff based on the crunch revisions.

This sort of feedback-response loop, I have found, works well.  At least for me.

[LordVreeg]

Going to answer ther three posts above as time allows, but just wanted to reply and say all three from Steerpike to Llum to Acrimone (who I've started to rhyme with Jiminy, for the hell of it) are perfect examples of GM's making the magic crunch match the fluff...very nice and though-provoking, all three.

[Acrimone]

It does rhyme with "A-jiminy".  Just imagine it's a Greek name.

[LordVreeg]

Steerpike,
A couple of thoughts.  Since Nectar that comes from the big-ass trees affects magic, is there some way you can link the Source of Magic to the trees as well, or at least the origin of both could link?  Perhaps some great-grandaddy tree?

Also, perhaps a spell success % roll would be in order, but if casting a spell normally out of reach (by using Nectar or something), you caould make failing a spell affect the caster's mind...how does that line up with your internal view?

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Most of the time these days I don't focus on what magic is, even if I include something in a setting I'd call "magic".  I've decided I like my magic to be kind of the opposite of what other people have said: I like it overt and blasting the heck out of things.  Subtlety is okay every once and a while, but I feel a primal desire to have people scream and beat their chests.

So my mechanics need to support that while sort of ignoring subtle magic.  For one thing this view of magic does not work with systems where what you do can be defined as a "spell".  For one thing the types of people using this probably aren't given to thinking complicatedly.  It works much better if you have generic powers: blast, shield, buff, etc.

[Steerpike]

While the Aether is intended as the kind of "Font of Magic," and the rune/glyph system is meant to somewhat align with Vance's "arcane mathematics" thing, the Elder Trees might perhaps be linked to the opening-up of the Aether to mortal minds, however... perhaps a very ancient (now long gone, or withered, or secret) Tree from which the god-trees of Moroi were once seeds of.  That whole section of the Cadaverous Earth's history would be WAAAAAY back in the past, however, and considering how vague even the relatively recent past is supposed to be, adventurers probably wouldn't stumble upon the Nature of Magic anytime soon.  I still might flesh out a theory of the Nature of Magic for my own satisfaction and for internal consistency in the setting, though, even if it goes "unused."

[Llum]

Seems to me that magic is ether Vancian kinda thing, or uses a mana/point system. Are there any other variations out there? If there are, how exactly did you come around to your system?

[LordVreeg]

Seems to me that magic is ether Vancian kinda thing, or uses a mana/point system. Are there any other variations out there? If there are, how exactly did you come around to your system?

Yes, but that is only in relation to 'how much you can cast in a set amount of time'.  Only one part of crunch.  
You still need to account the differences in types of magic (divine, bardic, illusionary, musical, weather, elemental, necromantic etc), does magic always work, do people have saves, what type of spells are common, and who can cast them in that particular setting?  Does magic work better at one time of the day, or worse during a time of the month?  How fast doeas a caster regain their power?  How do rituals work?

[Xeviat]

I'm at a crossroads in my developement. On one hand, I have fluff written up for my world that I'd love to develop rules for; on the other hand, I need to keep my group of players in mind. I took an inventory of how much time I have spent on stuff that hasn't gotten used (at the same time I inventoried how much money I've spent on D&D books that weren't really used), and I currently feel I'm going to need to budget myself a little better. For now, at least, I'm resigning to the notion that my setting is a D&D setting for my D&D group, so I'm going to treat it as such; sure I'll make new races, I might tweek one or two classes if time allows, and I might have a few houserules, but it is still going to be D&D.

In the future, if I publish my novels and attain some modicrum of popularity, I'll look into publishing my setting. Unless I licensed it out to a game company, I'd be more inclined to create something from the ground up.

I do think Vreeg (that is you, right?) has the right idea, though. There are many facets of magic that someone must look at before shaping their thoughts into workable crunch. To me, the fluff of a setting's magic becomes the most defining piece of crunch; nearly any game system would work for any setting if magic were taken out of the equasion (barring tone/mood issues, but those can be houseruled in).

For instance, I was absolutely in love with 3E's basic system, but the magic system always grated on me. Now I appreciate 4E's structure and balance, but I have since realized that their classifications of magic (Arcane, Divine, Primal, and so on ...) won't work for my setting if I'm 100% true to it. The magic system in the "Legend of the Five Rings" system would work a bit better for my setting, but I dislike that system's tentative (at best) grasp of balance (there is no system in place to determine what is a fair and challenging threat to make the party fight). I enjoy the Mutants and Masterminds system (and I may take a deep look at Warlords and Warriors, a M&M suppliment for fantasy settings that's coming out soon), but my players have a tendancy to "go crazy" with the freedom of that setting (either they don't know what to make, or what they make is incongruent to the theme and tone of the game).

To me, there's a balance a setting designer should seek to attain between the time they spend on their work and what is used by their players. For most of us, working on our setting is a hobby enough, but the more pragmatic amongst us want to get something out of it (either an end product, or just something usable by a group).

How was that Vreeg?

[LordVreeg]

I'm at a crossroads in my developement. On one hand, I have fluff written up for my world that I'd love to develop rules for; on the other hand, I need to keep my group of players in mind. I took an inventory of how much time I have spent on stuff that hasn't gotten used (at the same time I inventoried how much money I've spent on D&D books that weren't really used), and I currently feel I'm going to need to budget myself a little better. For now, at least, I'm resigning to the notion that my setting is a D&D setting for my D&D group, so I'm going to treat it as such; sure I'll make new races, I might tweek one or two classes if time allows, and I might have a few houserules, but it is still going to be D&D.

In the future, if I publish my novels and attain some modicrum of popularity, I'll look into publishing my setting. Unless I licensed it out to a game company, I'd be more inclined to create something from the ground up.

I do think Vreeg (that is you, right?) has the right idea, though. There are many facets of magic that someone must look at before shaping their thoughts into workable crunch. To me, the fluff of a setting's magic becomes the most defining piece of crunch; nearly any game system would work for any setting if magic were taken out of the equasion (barring tone/mood issues, but those can be houseruled in).

For instance, I was absolutely in love with 3E's basic system, but the magic system always grated on me. Now I appreciate 4E's structure and balance, but I have since realized that their classifications of magic (Arcane, Divine, Primal, and so on ...) won't work for my setting if I'm 100% true to it. The magic system in the "Legend of the Five Rings" system would work a bit better for my setting, but I dislike that system's tentative (at best) grasp of balance (there is no system in place to determine what is a fair and challenging threat to make the party fight). I enjoy the Mutants and Masterminds system (and I may take a deep look at Warlords and Warriors, a M&M suppliment for fantasy settings that's coming out soon), but my players have a tendancy to "go crazy" with the freedom of that setting (either they don't know what to make, or what they make is incongruent to the theme and tone of the game).

To me, there's a balance a setting designer should seek to attain between the time they spend on their work and what is used by their players. For most of us, working on our setting is a hobby enough, but the more pragmatic amongst us want to get something out of it (either an end product, or just something usable by a group).

How was that Vreeg?

Well, it's great, honestly.  
First off, the fact that you stepped back and looked at what has gotten used and what did not is something we should all do more often,. as GM's.  I know the feeling.  And a lot of that is looking at what your players like and what they do.  bravo to you for that.

I don't know if I totally agree with you that almost any system can work for any setting if you threw out magic; there is also the whole social skill vs. combat issue.  But I do agree with you that is is the #1 part of a system that needs to match the fluff.  #1.  So as you write and create, the system becomes something of the framework there.  Every bit of fiction I have writen for Celtricia has involved the guilds and their interconnection.  And knowing how well you do with crunch when you put your mind to it, I have no doubts you'll make a most outstanding system.  

And your comment about gettig something out of it is true in spades.  I always have to make my posting here come second to my gaming groups.

And maybe I'll codify that lsit of things to determine about a magic system.